We live, simultaneously, in two different worlds. Ultimately, we live in the World of Nature, a world that we did not create and the world upon which all life depends. Most immediately, we inhabit a "human world" that we create ourselves. Because our human world is the result of our own choices and actions, we can say, quite properly, that we live, most immediately, in a “political world.” In this blog, I hope to explore the interaction of these two worlds that we call home.

About Me

Gary A. Patton

I was an elected official in Santa Cruz County, California for twenty years, from 1975 to 1995. Now, I am an environmental attorney, practicing law in Santa Cruz County. If you would like to contact me, send me an email at gapatton@mac.com.

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Friday, September 8, 2017

#251 / Rising To The Bait #2

The NRA seems to be trying to provoke attacks on and by "liberals," whom the NRA has denominated "the violent left." Click on any of the following YouTube videos to see just how provocative the organization is trying to be.

More recently, in an article that ran in the San Jose Mercury News on August 27th, The Associated Press has reported that one Democratic congressional candidate is calling the videos "hate speech," and is suggesting that they are "sedition," the "wilful undermining of ... legal authority." The upshot of claims like these, of course, is that something should be done about it. "Hate speech" isn't good. And neither is a coordinated effort, backed by the NRA's big budget, to "undermine legal authority."

So if that is happening (and you can make up your own mind about the NRA videos, after watching one or more of them, linked below), the question becomes what we should do about it.

Here's what I'm thinking: NOTHING!

I think that the NRA is hoping to get decent people to attack free speech, and the NRA, as a reaction to the hateful use that the NRA is making of their free speech rights. The more violence that the NRA can generate, the more their claim that everyone needs to have a gun to "protect themselves" will seem to be legitimate.

Let's not rise to the bait. Let's not get hooked.

Let's laugh, instead, at these ludicrous efforts to provoke us into a violent reaction to the NRA's outrageous claims: